Main Channel Dredge
ABP Southampton has received consent from the Marine Management Organisation to improve the marine access to the Port of Southampton by undertaking a programme of capital dredging in Southampton Water, the River Test and the Solent.
Known as the Southampton Approach Channel Dredge (SACD), the work is part of an extensive programme of investment centred around improving the capability of the port to receive the largest vessels in the world long into the future.
The specific objectives of the SACD project are identified as a need to:
- improve marine access (tidal window) for draught constrained vessels;
- increase the ability of vessels to pass in the channel;
- improve safety of navigation;
- enable the Port to handle larger (deeper) vessels; thereby
- preserving the Port's commercial position and the positive contribution that it makes to the UK's local, regional and national economy.
In terms of nature conservation, significant parts of Southampton Water, the rivers Test and Itchen and the Solent are designated as a European Sites under the provisions of the Habitats Directive and, as a consequence, the impacts of the project have been assessed in accordance with the Directive and the enabling Regulations.
The consent issued by the MMO allows for:
(a) Widening works at Marchwood to improve navigation safety for vessels accessing the container terminal: the channel will be widened by 30m at the existing maintained dredge level of -12.6m CD over a length of about 0.9 km
(b) Improvement of the port main access channel, including:
(i) Widening of the channel from the existing maintained dredge level of -12.6m CD to -13.6m CD over a length of about 5.4 km between Dock Head and Fawley and between Hook and Hamble Spit, in order to allow crossing of vessels and improve traffic management and safety, in a phased dredge programme;
(ii) deepening of the outer channel to improve the tidal window for accessing the port: the Thorn channel will be deepened from -12.6m CD to -13.8m CD, and the Nab channel will be deepened from -13.3m CD to -14.8m CD;
(iii) construction of an environmental compensation site at Cobnor Point in Chichester Harbour; and (iv) design and environmental studies and environmental monitoring.
Dredging works will be implemented in phases from 2013 to 2015.